Microsoft Says Its Tech Isn’t Harming Civilians in Gaza… Are You Sure?
Microsoft released a blog post this week saying that it found no evidence its technology was used by the Israeli military to harm civilians in Gaza. This follows both internal and external reviews that the company says were launched in response to concerns raised by employees and public outcry over reported military use of Microsoft’s cloud and AI tools.
But even as Microsoft presents this as a clean bill of health, the fine print tells a more complicated story.
The company admits it has limited visibility into how its tools are actually used. That includes anything hosted on private servers or on-prem systems, meaning Microsoft can't fully account for how its software and AI products might be deployed once they're out of its direct control. In other words, the review can only go so far.
“It is worth noting that militaries typically use their own proprietary software or applications from defense-related providers... Microsoft has not created or provided such software or solutions to the IMOD,” the company said.
That’s a safe statement — but also a narrow one. It focuses on what Microsoft didn’t explicitly build, rather than what capabilities it might have indirectly enabled. The blog also confirms Microsoft maintains a commercial relationship with the Israeli Ministry of Defense, providing software, AI services (like language translation), and cloud infrastructure. It even offered emergency support following the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023 — describing the assistance as “tightly controlled” and subject to internal ethical standards.
What Microsoft doesn’t mention in the post is arguably more telling than what it does. Nowhere are Palestinians or Palestine mentioned by name. Not once. That omission didn’t go unnoticed.
“They claim their technology isn’t harming people in Gaza,” said Hossam Nasr, an organizer with the employee-led group No Azure for Apartheid. “But they also admit they don’t know how their tech is being used on Israeli servers.”
Nasr, who was fired by Microsoft after protesting at a company event, pointed out that the post was published on Nakba Day — the annual remembrance of the 1948 Palestinian displacement. He calls it a PR move designed to “whitewash” the company’s image ahead of its Build developer conference, where more protests are expected.
No Azure for Apartheid has been clear in its demands: cancel contracts with the Israeli military and publicly disclose all business relationships with the Israeli government. The group includes both current and former Microsoft employees. Earlier this year, two employees were fired after a vigil over the company’s defense ties. That was followed by multiple disruptions at Microsoft’s 50th anniversary celebration in April — including one protester calling AI chief Mustafa Suleyman a “war profiteer” in the middle of his remarks.
Internally, tensions are escalating. Nasr claims an employee poll showed 90 percent opposition to Microsoft’s military contracts with Israel. The group also submitted a petition with over 1,500 worker signatures. Microsoft has yet to publicly acknowledge it.
What we’re seeing isn’t just about one conflict. It’s about how tech giants handle accountability, especially when their products get folded into military or surveillance infrastructure. Microsoft is positioning itself as a neutral platform provider — but it’s also admitting it doesn’t always know where or how that platform is being used. That’s a serious gap in visibility for a company that touts ethical AI and responsible cloud use as cornerstones of its brand.
And this isn’t happening in a vacuum. Google and Amazon are also under fire for Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion Israeli government cloud initiative. Microsoft, notably, lost out on that contract in 2021. So its public denial of deeper military entanglement might also be a subtle way to distinguish itself from competitors in the eyes of employees, investors, and customers.
But the strategy seems clear: stay just close enough to lucrative government deals to benefit, while drawing a line at direct complicity. The question is whether that line still matters when the infrastructure you sell becomes the foundation for operations you can’t (or won’t) monitor.
As protests spread across tech campuses and more employees begin to organize around ethical concerns, there’s a bigger pattern taking shape here. Workers are drawing hard lines around how their labor and tools get used. Leadership, meanwhile, is playing defense — often responding with terminations, silence, or blog posts written in corporate legalese.
So here’s the real takeaway: Microsoft says its hands are clean. But it also says it doesn’t know what’s happening in the places where it can’t look. And its employees are increasingly unwilling to accept that kind of answer.